Implications of social media and money-induced voting behavior on governance crises in Nigeria

Abstract

This paper investigates the influence of social media and money on voting behavior and its impact on governance crises. It argues that the effect of tampered voting behavior due to intra-party moneyinducement during election on governance crises in Nigeria has received very little attention. Indeed, general elections in Nigeria, have heavily been money-ladened, and money has effectively been used to  tamper voters’ behavior. Voters’ have changed their minds on who to vote for, just because money was given to them. Thus, how heavily  monetized voting behavior stimulate governance crises remain largely underrepresented in the literature. Drawing on qualitative  method, this article measured incessant governance crises in Nigeria from the prism of monetized voting behavior. The findings provide  adequate information on the dimension of money and social media politics in Nigeria’s primary elections. It also advances knowledge on  the link between governance crises and monetization of voters’ behavior. It concludes that the emergence of the current Nigerian  president, which is largely based on monetization of voters and abusive use of social media tools, is the leading cause of current crises in  governance in Nigeria.